Chinese crude drugs or spices eg. Zingiber officinale, Eugenia caryophyllata, Allium sativum, have been used in medicine and in flavoring foods. Crude ginger is used as an anti-emetic and expectorant, an anti-tussive and accelerator of the digestive organs. Semi-dried old crude ginger is also used for stomachache, chest pain, low back pain, cough, common cold and as a cure for a form of edema being called "stagnate of water". Zingerone is the major component which accounts for the spicy character of ginger; gingerol and shogaol are other pungent components in ginger. Gingerol has cardio-tonic action, suppresses the contraction of isolated portal veins in mice, and modulates the eicosanoid-induced contraction of mouse and rat blood vessels. Shogaol exhibits pressor response. Both gingerol and shogaol are mutagenic, whereas zinger and zingerone have been found to exhibit antimutagenic activity. Shogaol has inhibitory activity on the carrageenin-induced paw edema and platelet aggregation [U.S. Pat. No. 5,804,603, Background of the Invention].
Heretofore, many reports have shown that Zingiber officinale exhibits various physiological activities. Typical examples include a cancer metastasis suppressing agent disclosed in Japan patent publication No. 7-258104; a synthesis promoter for neurotropic factor, which is effective for nerve deteriorative diseases such as Alzheimer's dementia or Parkinson's disease, disclosed in Japan patent publication No. 7-25777; an anti-rheumatic agent disclosed in Japan patent publication No. 6-293653, U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,494,668 and 5,683,698; an antimicrobial composition disclosed in Japan patent publication No. 6-227931; and an analgesic composition disclosed in Japan patent publication No. 6-107556. Ginger contains 1-4% essential oil (oleoresin). During the last 45 years many chemical investigations have been carried out on the constituents of the essential oil. Altogether more than 200 different volatiles have been identified in essential oil wherein the pharmacological activity is confined. The essential oil contains a mixture of various terpenes as well as some other non-terpenoid compounds. Although this is mostly speculative, the experimental data and observations suggest that ginger inhibits both the cyclooxygenase and lypoxygenase products, i.e. it can be a dual inhibitor of eicosanoid synthesis. In all 56 patients (28 with rheumatoid arthritis, 18 with osteoarthritis and 10 with muscular discomfort) used powdered ginger against their afflictions. Amongst the arthritis patients more than three-quarters experienced, to varying degrees, relief in pain and swelling. All the patients with muscular discomfort experienced relief in pain. None of the patients reported adverse effects during the period of ginger consumption which ranged from 3 months to 2.5 years. (Srivastava and Mustafa; Medical Hypotheses; 1992; 39 342-348).
Non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs have three major actions, all of which are related to inhibition of cyclo-oxygenase resulting in decreased formation of prostanoids. Firstly, an anti-inflammatory action achieved by reduced production of vasodilator prostaglandins (PGE2, PGI2) which means less vasodilation and, indirectly less edema. Secondly, an analgesic effect achieved by reduced prostaglandin production (less sensitization of nociceptic nerve endings to the inflammatory mediators bradykinin and 5-hydroxytryptamine). Thirdly, an antipyretic effect which is probably due to a decrease in the mediator PGE2 generated in response to inflammatory pyrogens, much as interleukin-1. Since ginger inhibits prostanoid synthesis and also products of 5-lipoxygenase, its ameliorative effects in arthritis and muscular discomforts could be related to reduced formation of prostanoids and leukotrienes. Because of such a possibility a decrease in the carageenan-induced edema formation in the rat's paw after 3 g of ginger extract administration has been demonstrated and the potency of the extract in the acute inflammation test appears to be comparable to that exhibited by acetyl salicylic acid reported in the same study. (Mascolo N. et al Journal of Ethnopharmocology 1989, 27, 129-140).